SPU puts classes on hold for a little hope

Students, faculty and staff spend day looking at the bigger picture

AMY ROLP, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

By AMY ROLPH, P-I REPORTER

Published 10:00 pm, Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Seattle Pacific University student Beth Burdick looks at the faculty exhibit "Hope: Open/Closed" at the SPU Art Center Gallery, which is open to the public through Friday. The exhibit follows the theme of the university's "Day of Common Learning."
Photo: Karen Ducey/Seattle Post-Intelligencer

And if someone was, chances are the person was looking at the concept from a less-traditional angle -- an angle defined by hope.

Hope -- that was the topic that colored all others at SPU on Wednesday, when class was dismissed for a "Day of Common Learning." The campuswide event, quickly becoming an annual tradition, is meant to clear heads of the muddled residue of academia and allow students, staffers and faculty to concentrate solely on a big-picture concept.

"Common learning" projects are finding their way into academic planning at universities and colleges across the country, usually through "common books," such as Elizabeth Kolbert's "Field Notes From a Catastrophe" -- the one circulated at the University of Washington this year.

"One of our core responsibilities is to hold up scholarship and the world of ideas as something the entire campus should embrace," said Susan Gallagher, director of SPU's Center for Scholarship and Faculty Development.

Though participation in the common-learning event about hope wasn't mandatory, many students sheepishly admitted that they had to attend the day's activities because of a class assignment or extra credit. But most were quick to add that they did "get something out of it."

"I feel that the element of hope has been lost in a lot of the ways people relate with God and with others," said theology major Sarah Reed, a senior.

The superstar for the day at the small Christian university was Jurgen Moltmann, the German theologian who rocked religious circles with his book "Theology of Hope" in the 1960s. About 2,000 SPU students and employees packed into the school's Royal Brougham Pavilion to hear him talk about caring for the planet, re-examining theories of evolution and -- the most emphasized topic -- loving life.

"Viva la vida," Moltmann said, the words punctuated with his thick, German accent. "Long live life."

In spirit with the day's theme, faculty pulled together a list of almost 20 workshops. Three nursing teachers talked about encountering hope in patients who are suffering. A history professor examined the "simmering anger" that underlies American popular culture.

And an associate professor of Christian ministry, Jeff Keuss, gave a presentation called "the gospel of hope according to Bruce Springsteen," which he admitted might have been "flying the '80s flag pretty high."

Last year, the common-learning topic was "becoming globally educated," which paralleled the launch of SPU's campaign for global engagement. Next year, the focus will be on the concept of beauty.

Moltmann's visit was the reason "hope" was chosen as this year's theme, Gallagher said. "It's something that our world so desperately needs," she said. "His idea of hope is that because we have hope, we act in the world -- we don't check out."